


Touchy-Feely

by katsukiy



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Cuddling, First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Keith pines a lot, Keith swears a lot in his head, Keith was a dinosaur kid, Lance is touchy-feely, Latino Lance (Voltron), M/M, Mentions of the other paladins - Freeform, Pining, These two are ridiculous, abuse of italic as usual, secretly touch-starved keith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-26
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-08-17 12:57:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8144867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katsukiy/pseuds/katsukiy
Summary: Lance was staring at him, still with that weird expression, like he had just been caught with a hand in the cookie jar. Which was at most confusing, because it was Keith who had made it weird by caressing longingly his damn foot. Or: Lance touches Keith, a lot, and Keith has a foot fetish? (He doesn't)





	

**Author's Note:**

> I really, really don't know how to title things. Also, Keith as a dinosaur kid, am I right?  
> I had this titled as "Mindless cuddling", just throwing it out there.

It started with small touches.

 

The first time it happened, it was because Keith had done some _particularly_ poor planning and got himself more bruised than usual after a mission. Lance had got out of Blue, almost jogging towards him, like if running from a flock of vicious chicken (and hell if that didn’t sound hilarious, but Lance looked positively murderous and Keith didn’t want to risk it).

Keith didn’t know he had held his breath until Lance hit his chest, and it got knocked out of him. Instead of a punch in the face, though, Lance just grabbed him by the collar of his suit, got all into his personal space and said “Don’t ever do that again, you fucking _moron,_ ” and with a final, labored breath, he left the dock, presumably to shower.

Shiro, who had just then caught up to them, looked at him pointedly and nodded solemnly. Of course, that wouldn’t be the last of it, because _of course_ there would have been a proper scolding in front of everyone, but just that much was enough to make him feel vaguely guilty.

Lance didn’t mention it again.

 

The second time, a Galra ship suddenly collided with Red, coming out of nowhere. Lance screamed something in the comm, but Keith didn’t hear it because of the ominous shrilling in his ears. The Galra ship was violently thrown away from him and freezed, and he distractedly saw Hunk destroy it.

Again, on the dock, Lance was walking towards him, but no hit came. Lance put his hands on Keith’s shoulders, barely touching, and determinedly didn’t meet his eyes. “Good job out there, pal,” Lance grinned, squeezed a little and started walking away. Keith blinked. What the…?

  


After that, Keith couldn’t stop wondering about it. What was Lance even _thinking_? Except for that two weird, freak show events, the blue paladin remained the usual annoying, boisterous little shit with a thing for epic arch-nemeses, making a point of dissing Keith whenever he could. Their fights had gotten repetitive and absolutely ridiculous, to the point where he himself would’ve given an arm (the one he didn’t use for brandishing his sword, thank you very much) to avoid them.

The fact was, Lance knew how to rile him up. It was like a well practiced move, like Keith was just a string of Lance’s dickish “rivalry instrument” and whenever he wished, he’d just pluck it and Keith would twist the way he wanted him to.

 

Also, there was _touching_. A lot of it. Like, a lot more than Keith would’ve been comfortable with, had it been a typical situation. But of course it wasn’t. There wasn’t anything _typical_ about Lance. He was unpredictable, in the worst of ways. He would say and do things that Keith didn’t even try to understand, because it was gibberish to him.

 

He wasn’t a people person, never had been. It’s not like he didn’t _want to_. But after being alone for so long, he got rusty with interpersonal relationships, so much that it made him embarrassed to talk too much. And a big part of the deal was also his natural wariness, which, in matter of chatting amiably with strangers, was a no-no. He had a tendency to close up in himself like a hedgehog, just with less spines and more sarcasm. Fortunately, he had hit it off with the others in the Voltron team pretty well (even with Lance, no matter how much he kept spouting about “rivalry and honor”), and it seemed like their personalities balanced each others in a particularly harmonic way. Wacky Voltron magic, am I right? That still didn’t mean he was a fan of group hugs- or at least that’s what he liked to tell himself at night.

 

So when Lance had started brushing his hand on his side sometimes after training, or pressing his thigh against Keith’s under the table at lunch (and seriously, how did he do that? The table was like six meters long!), he just- faltered a little but ultimately pretended like nothing had happened. Every single time. And there had been plenty.

 

It was _fine_. Nothing wrong. Not like Keith’s heart started hammering in his throat whenever he felt Lance’s touch. Zilch.

 

At first they were more sparse, fluttering touches; wherever, usually his torso or his arms. Lance would not look at him and skim his fingers on his bicep, usually saying something witty and totally moronic, like “You totally sucked in training today, dude”, but with his mouth curled in a wide grin.

They went on like that, Keith replying with sarcastic mockery, Lance getting offended, Pidge and Hunk sighing while looking at each other, Shiro scolding them. Same old, same old.

 

Then, the touching became more focused. It would last more than the usual, fingers holding, not just grazing. And Lance actually _looked_ at him now, with this intense, concentrated gaze, his eyebrows adorably scrunched up, like he was waiting for a reaction.

...That never came, because Keith’s ears were roaring and he couldn’t look him in the eyes; because then Lance would _see_ , that not-so-tiny part of him that screamed and trashed, _touch me more_ , _touch me again._ Of course Lance would make fun of him for that, and it was embarrassing as hell. Not just because it was _Lance_ , which was surely more than enough, but also because he had always tried to bury that part of himself, so _needy_ and desperate, and he’d done a fine job of it, at least until now.

 

So obviously it would be fucking Lance to shit all over his convictions, leaving him confused and clueless.

On one hand, he would have liked to close up again. Just shove the feelings back in, avoid Lance like a rare disease and be done with it. That would’ve been fine, also, if only he hadn’t had the _whole universe_ ’s destiny on his shoulders. Worst thing, he shared the burden with Lance, and the others too. Keith would’ve been okay shouldering it by himself- it would’ve been better, even, with no one else to inconvenience with his stupid _feelings_. He could be focused, and save everyone, and sacrifice himself for the best cause, _if only he were alone_.

 

But he wasn’t, and now he had to suck it up and find _balance_. And balance would straight up be thrown into the gutter if he started avoiding Lance, just because he couldn’t deal with a dumb crush with a side of touch craving. So, he didn’t. Avoid Lance, that is.

 

And Lance was just so bright, streaming nonsense whenever he could, touching his hands and his arms and, one shocking day, his face. Just like that, patting his cheek, only to drop his hand one moment later like nothing had happened, like Keith hadn’t just _combusted_ , his insides burning up while Lance chatted amiably, telling him that _no, Death Note is absolutely superior to anything else I have tried to read on that line of work, believe me, it’s_ the shit.

 

What could Keith do? He dealt with it. And pined. He pined like no one else’s business, and yet tried to appear casual, almost neutral about it. Never reciprocated or initiated anything, but hell, he would’ve died to touch Lance back. To just bask in his not-caresses, huddle close and let him pet his fucking hair. What the shit, he was so done for.

 

Thing is, Lance _was_ , admittedly, a touchy feely one. He had seen him poke and hug and generally be super friendly with the other paladins, too. But sometimes he felt like the careless touching that was going on with them was a little different than the intense, weirdly tentative one Lance was subjecting him to. Of course, that would be just his delusions talking, so he paid the feeling no mind.

 

Keith knew it in his heart, though. That a disaster was bound to happen, sooner or later. And it did.

  


Lance had started hanging out in his room. Don’t ask him why, but it was like that now. Probably it was the fact that after a fight to defend the universe, no one liked to be alone. And Lance seemed to be particularly prone to loneliness, honestly, so it wasn’t a surprise when one night he rasped at his door, looking particularly young and messy, and sat on his bed, starting one of his nutty conversations about everything and nothing at once. The red paladin just couldn’t help it, he went with it.

 

There was a weird thing about Lance: his presence could light up any room he was in. His sunny smile, his stupid jokes, his confident, almost cocky stance were so bright it seemed to resonate around him; like an aura, if you believe in such things. Of course sometimes Lance would feel shitty, and the aura dimmed a little then, Keith noticed. And yet the brave, selfless blue paladin put up an act of glee even in that moments. It was all so strange to Keith, who used to store all his feelings in, let them stew for ages, bubbling up to the surface in bursts of anger and, let’s admit, incomparable broodiness. Lance’s way was, in itself, a way of closing up, he knew, but a better one at that nonetheless, or so it seemed to him.

 

 

That day was one of those. Lance was smiling, but it was a little chipped and wouldn’t reach his eyes. He was sprawled on Keith’s bed, his feet dangling a little, and he was recounting about that time he had tried to bake a cake and forgot the flour. “ _Mamá_ yelled at me a little, then started laughing super hard. She took the batter out of the pan and added the flour herself. In the end, it even tasted good!”

 

They had just showered after training, so his hair was still a little wet and looked really soft. Keith was perched on the small space remaining on the bed, a little guarded, because seeing Lance like this made _things_ to him, and he didn’t want to mess up. So he just looked at him, with undeniable heart eyes, and scoffed a little. “Of course you would forget the most important ingredient,” he snarked tepidly.

 

Lance sat up, and his right foot gently collided with Keith’s knee.

“And what do you know about baking, desert boy?” he countered, with no heat behind it, the lines around his eyes now finally a little smoother.

 

Keith hummed. Lance’s foot snaked up his leg, now resting on his thigh, and the weight of it there was nice.

“Well,” he replied, with mirth in his voice, “Sometimes, when I was little, mom would let me help her. We baked a cake once for my eighth birthday.” he looked intent now, like he was trying to look at something really blurry. Lance stopped breathing, as if trying not to spook a wild animal, and carefully tried to move his foot away.

 

Distractedly, Keith’s hand catched it. His long fingers grasped it delicately, and his thumb started moving in circles on the bare flesh. Lance stilled abruptly, but Keith was too absorbed to notice.

 

“I really wanted a dinosaur, you know,” the paladin continued, in a daze, a small smile tugging at the angles of his mouth “but mom said it would’ve been too complicated, so we had to compromise and it ended up as a sport car.” He chuckled softly.

 

The sound seemed to shake him. His eyes raised to look at Lance, who was still trying not to move too much and appeared almost guilty. (He kinda felt like it, too. Keith never talked about his past. Actually, he didn’t talk much at all. He was stubborn and fought like a panther, but was so closed off sometimes even Lance couldn’t manage to pry his head open. So it felt like intruding in a private moment, even though it was a completely spontaneous one.)

 

Keith narrowed his eyes. What- oh. His hand stopped moving. He knew something like this would’ve happened, eventually. He was good at controlling himself, but Lance had a way of making him lose it that was simply amazing. He yearned for this for too long, had let himself get too close. And Lance, with his constant touches, wasn’t helping his case at all. When he heard his name being called out, almost reverently, he flinched.

 

Lance was staring at him, still with that weird expression, like he had just been caught with a hand in the cookie jar. Which was at most confusing, because it was Keith who had made it weird by caressing longingly his damn foot. So, he just said so.

 

“Sorry for-” he dropped his hand to his side, blushed hard, and huffed “this.”

 

Lance blinked. “Sorry for… What?”

 

Keith now had a pinched, flustered expression, he knew that much. “Do you have to make me say it?”

 

Just then, something strange happened with the face of the blue paladin. Keith was there. Emotions flickered on his face: first understanding, then an incredible, blinding smugness. “Dude,” he said, elongating the “u” sound a little. “I knew it! I knew you wanted me!”

 

The sudden exclamation made Keith recoil, and Lance all but scrambled up to follow him, his hands up in the air, a splitting grin on his face.

 

This was… Was Lance making fun of him? Oh, hell no. He was dumb enough to fall for the _dumbest_ of them all, but not that much. He prepared himself to fight tooth and nail, didn’t even know what _for_ , but then something enveloped him. It was Lance. And his stupid arms. Those were what enveloped him.

 

Oh my god, was Lance _hugging_ him?

 

“What. Are. You. Doing.” Keith’s nose was in Lance’s stupid, fluffy hair. And it smelled good. This was all so unfair. Lance’s arms tightened around him, and he let out a somewhat shrill laugh.

 

“What does it look like I’m doing, buddy?” the blue paladin quipped, with a “ _duh_ ” strongly implied. “I’m hugging you!”

 

Keith would have pinched his nose, if only his hands had been free, but they weren’t, so he resumed to rolling his eyes. The hug was already becoming uncomfortably long, and the worst thing was that Keith was liking this definitely too much. “And what are you doing that for?”

 

Lance released him and backed up just a little, enough to look at him in the eyes, still with that blinding smile etched on his face. “Because I like you, Keith,” he almost spelled. His grin faded into a more serious expression. “I really do. Beats me why, but I do.” he then resumed the grinning.

 

That left him… Confused. Since he was already blushing, it was a lost cause trying to hide the fact that he was probably having heart palpitations. “Do... you?” Did he? How was that possible? Did he miss something? Well, the touches _were_ a bit extra, but Keith was- oh god. How could he have missed it?

 

Lance looked like he was about to knock him in the head. “Yeah!” he bellowed, “What do you think all that touching was for? Seriously, man, do you think I’m like this with anyone? Because that’s just so wrong I can’t even begin to-”

 

“You are,” Keith interrupted him, because he knew better than to let him go on, and he wanted to get to the end of this “a really… _touchy_ person.”

 

Well now, that was just adorable. Keith looked so lost, and a little jealous?, and Lance was about to kiss him senseless. But, it seemed, he had to explain himself first. And he was super ready to get to the kissing part, it being that the crush he had for Keith was almost older than Allura. So he inhaled, exhaled and cupped Keith’s face with his hands. And he paled only a little, which was- good?

 

“Keith,” he said “I really, really fucking like you. I’ve been trying to woo you for months. And I know, now, that you like me back. And maybe that you have a thing for feet, but that’s not the point- So, can we kiss before saying anything else? I feel like I might die if I don’t do it soon.”

 

Keith scrunched up his nose. This was _so not_ how he had pictured it would go, when he allowed himself to picture it. He had imagined something more soft, and romantic, than Lance implying he had a foot fetish and threatening to die. But he had to admit, this was more realistic. So, whatever. He could roll with it. Lance liked him back. Okay.

 

“Go on,” he allowed, a little breathily. And Lance, for the love of god, smirked and plunged forward.

 

Their teeth clashed, obviously, and Lance had to stop to snicker. “I don’t even know what I’m doing, to be honest,” he admitted, and Keith was glad to see that he was embarrassed too right now. He leaned into Lance’s hands, still around his face, and definitely did not nuzzle. Just like Lance definitely did not gasp at that.

 

“We’ll have to figure it out as we go, then,” he concluded, in a whisper, and met his mouth again. This time it was softer, just lips touching lips, and it was really nice. They kept kissing for at least half an hour, couldn’t stop. No tongue or anything, because both of them were too abashed to even propose it, and no one wanted to make an ass of himself by doing it first. It’s not like they cared, though, and Lance secretly thought that he would’ve loved to wash his teeth first, at least.

 

He was also pretty sure Keith had suddenly become a octopus. Not that having him there, trying to choke-hold him was something he minded.

 

In the middle of kissing, though, they had found that doing so while laying down was more comfortable, so they did just that.

 

The silence in between the kissing was comfortable. They really had nothing else to say, and even if they did, there would have been time to do that later.

 

They were now facing each other, their heads mere centimetres apart, and one of the two would sometimes close the distance. Lance did, this time, making a terrible smacking sound, and Keith sighed. But Lance could see the fond, so he didn’t protest.

 

“I don’t have a foot fetish, anyway,” the red paladin grumbled, as an afterthought.

 

Lance laughed. “Aw, babe, it’s okay if you do. I have beautiful feet!”

 

Keith became really red. _Babe_. He extended a hand, smacked Lance’s arm, and then grabbed it. He coughed subtly, surging forward while urging him to do the same with a firm tug, and buried his nose in Lance’s chest.  

 

The blue paladin was just gleeful. He tangled his legs with his boyfriend's (that’s what they were now, right?) and sing songed “You’re a cuddler!” he was met with a deadly silence. “Oh my god, you totally are! I thought you would bite off my hands if I even tried something, but boy was I wrong!”

 

Keith sniffled primly. “Shut up and cuddle me, you dimwit,” he said, muffled into his shirt.

 

Lance was more than happy to oblige. He’d have to ask Hunk the technicalities of making a dinosaur cake, later.

**Author's Note:**

> The cake incident really happened. I forgot flour. Yep. I'm Lance in this. (Only I was the one to add the flour in the end, but the cake really tasted good, so there's that, heh)  
> (A wild Keith angst appears! But it's very mild; I just couldn't stop myself from sprinkling it here and there. Pardon)  
> Come scream Klance at me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/nebucch)! (There's a Mystic Messenger blow up going strong right now, if you're interested *nudges)  
> As always, thanks to my beta for being the best at cheering me up and making me notice stupid things I wrote. I love you.
> 
> It would be super duper cool if you let me know if you liked this with a kudo or a comment! Please be gentle, but firm?  
> 


End file.
